Hyaku bento (#100)
A 100th bento calls for cake! So in the upper right corner of the first tier there’s a mini almond cake (in pink wrapping) that I found in elma’s surprise packet. It is sided by an Anpanman orange candy and a packet of soy sauce for my inarizushi on the left. In the middle there’s Maki’s carrot kinpira and a small container of pickled ginger on the right.

The second tier overflows with miso tamago and edamame sprinkled with shichimi on a bed of romaine lettuce. I usually like my boiled eggs soft so I tried that with this batch of miso tamago, but they really taste better when hard-boiled.

Hyaku bento might not look very special to you, but it is pretty rare for me to compose a 100% Japanese lunchbox. Confession: I prefer my edamame with FairTrade African Peper Mix but because of my Nippon theme I had to use shichimi, or nanami togarashi, a traditional Japanese mix of 7 spices. In which there are actually only 4, according to the label on my bottle: red chili pepper, sesame seeds, nori and lemonpeel. MIA: poppy seed, hemp seed and sancho (pepper). But let’s not digress ;)

This bento was my well-deserved lunch on a day-long hike called De Blauwe Kamer (‘The Blue Room’), named after a riverside nature reserve in Utrecht province. The day started out cold but got better along the way, so I had a nice time. Priorfatgirl had challenged us to workout for 60 minutes on April the 20th and somehow I managed to expand that into 6 hours ;) Of which I took 30 minutes to eat my bento btw. I also had some geen kukicha tea, apple juice and tab water. No hydration problems here ;)

This seems a good moment to tell you that I joined in a new round of the 100 Mile Fitness Challenge too, running from April – June. I just barely finished my 162 kilometers / 100 miles the first and second time, so I guess I need a little push to get going sometimes ;)

View of hiking area De Blauwe Kamer

Impressions of my day: WINDY, the smell of ground pinewood, water, cuckoo-flowers-a-plenty, traditional Dutch landscape, singing birds, crossing borders (the river Rijn is a natural divider between Utrecht province and Gelderland and I’ve been hopping across) and oh, did I mention it was windy?

There are some details about De Blauwe Kamer that might be handy for other people going to walk this Capitool route, but I’ve added those to this post in Dutch.

Additional remarks about the track in Dutch

Enige opmerkingen m.b.t. de wandeling die wellicht handig zijn voor een volgende wandelaar.

Kijk op de Capitool-site voor gewijzigde instructies voor deze wandeling. Zo is een pad naar de veerpont afgesloten en is de route op de Grebbeberg vrij vaag; echt verdwalen kun je echter niet.

Horeca & toiletgelegenheid
Het Veerhuis is (anno april 2010) dagelijks geopend vanaf 10:00. Het Bezoekerscentrum van de Blauwe Kamer aan de overzijde van de rivier heeft ook een restaurant. Aan de buitenzijde van het informatiecentrum is een net toilet (vrij toegankelijk).

Veerpont
De veerpont kost €0,50 enkele reis (voetganger). Vaartijden:
ma t/m za 6:30 – 2100
zo 9:00 – 21:00
Let op: feitelijk vaart de laatste pont ca. 15 minuten voor genoemde sluitingstijd!

** Disclaimer: deze details waren accuraat ten tijde van deze blogpost en bedoeld ter assistentie. Ik ben niet aansprakelijk wanneer de gegevens niet meer overeenkomen met de actualiteit. Ze kunnen worden gecheckt op de websites van de betreffende organisaties. **